West can’t get Syrian opp to peace talks, blames Russia - Lavrov

Free Syrian Army fighters take positions behind a damaged car as they fire their weapons during an offensive against forces loyal to Syria's President Bashar al-Assad in Aleppo's Salaheddine neighbourhood, October 9, 2013. (Reuters/Malek Alshemali) / Reuters

Russia’s Foreign Minister has criticized the US for its inability to bring the Syrian opposition to the Geneva II peace conference and for trying to shift the responsibility for the currently stalled negotiations on Russia.

“It is strange to hear repeated statements by some US state
department officials that we are moving towards Geneva II, but
it’s important that Russia puts pressure on Damascus. They are
shifting the blame. We are actually putting pressure on Damascus,
and it really works” Sergey Lavrov said on Monday after the
talks with Honduran Foreign Minister Mireya Aguero.

The Russian Foreign Minister pointed at the fact that it’s the
Syrian National Council which refused to take part in the peace
conference. And the US was responsible for compelling it to
participate.

"The main obstacle to this endeavor is still the inability of
our partners to force the Syrian opposition, whom they are
supporting, to come to Geneva and sit down at the negotiating
table with the government in order to find ways out of this
crisis by general consent," Sergey Lavrov said as cited by
Interfax.

Kerry reiterated the US position that President Bashar Assad
should resign, a demand very much in tune with the demands of the
Syrian opposition, which has said his departure is a precondition
for a peace conference.

"We believe that President Assad has lost the legitimacy
necessary to be a cohesive force that could bring people
together," Reuters reported Kerry as saying. "There has to
be a transition government in Syria to permit the possibility of
peace."

Both Kerry and Lavrov have called on all sides to set an exact
date for the talks as soon as possible. Russia’s Foreign Minister
said that "only the Jihadists can win in case of delay."
He believes that if the peace process does not start in Syria the
consequences will be grave and far-reaching.

“It’s more than just a tangle of controversies inside this
country. We are seeing here underground processes, which are
quite destructive, spreading throughout the Middle East and North
Africa” Lavrov said. “If it keeps going on like this and
if the peace process does not materialize, the consequences will
be felt far outside the region.”

The prospect of Geneva-2 peace negotiations was called into
question on Sunday, when the Syrian National Council, a major
opposition group announced it would not participate in the
talks.

The announcement was followed by a series of blasts in Damascus, including a mortar attack on
Syrian TV. Experts believe the escalation of violence at the time
when the UN inspectors are working in the country, could be used
by rebel fighters to disrupt the peace process.

On Monday Syria officially became a member of the Organization
for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW). A week ago,
Damascus began destroying the first chemical weapons which,
according to the US-Russian deal made during Geneva talks in
September, have to be fully eliminated by June 30, 2014.

Geneva-2 is a much delayed follow-up to an earlier round of talks
on Syria, which were held in June 2012. Back then Russia and the
United States agreed on having a second peace conference.
However, that kept getting postponed, mostly because of the
Syrian opposition being divided on whether it should participate.